Money was also a big issue. White people were wealthier than the blacks they also had better jobs and housing. The white children had school buses whilst black people had to walk to school and the white community’s school was quite lavish whilst the black school were only a few wooden houses.
“Consisting of four weather - beaten wooden houses on stilts of bricks”
The difference in wealth between the blacks and whites was because the county supported the white people and gave them money whilst they supported the black people very little and the small amount of money the black people
got was mostly from the black churches.
When Little Man gets his reading book at the start of the term he is very excited to have a book but when he looks inside there is a list of previous owners, their race and the condition of the book he then realises that the books belonged to white children and as soon as the book’s condition deteriorates and worn it is handed down to the black people. This annoys Little Man and he asks for another book very apprehensively.
“I – I said may I have another book please, Ma’am,” he squeaked. “That one’s dirty.”
Cassie realises what has upset Little Man and she sticks up for him by also refusing her book. This makes the teacher, ‘Miss Crocker,’ cross and they both get the switch. When Miss Crocker tells Mama what has happened in class Mama agrees with Miss Crocker but in her mind she understands why Cassie and Little Man had refused the books she then covers the list with paper and glue of all seventh grade books. This shows us that Mama is not frightened to show her views and beliefs even if they are against other peoples. She also does this by teaching her pupils what she wants to teach and not what she is told to teach.
Another incident happens which opens Cassie’s eyes and makes her less naïve about racism in the society. This happens when T.J, Stacey and Cassie go into Strawberry with Big Ma. Whilst Big Ma attends to some business the children go into the mercantile and start being served by Mr Barnett. Halfway through, a white woman comes into the shop and he serves her instead. Cassie can understand Mr Barnett serving the lady first but when he stops again to serve a white child Cassie gets annoyed and confronts him.
“I think you forgot, but you were waiting on us ‘fore
you was waiting on this girl here,”
Mr Barnett humiliates Cassie by telling her to get out of his shop till she knows who she is.
“And make sure she don’t come back till yo’ mammy teach her what she is.”
Matters get worse for Cassie when she accidentally bumps into a white girl called Lillian Jean when she goes out of the mercantile and she is forced to apologise by Lillian’s Jeans father, Mr Simms. Cassie describes the day with sad memories calling it the crueliest day of her life.
“No day in all my life had ever been as cruel as this one”
This incident shows us that the white people thought they were superior to the black people. They thought they had purer blood, that they were closer to god and they also thought that they were more intelligent then the blacks. Because the white people thought they were so
superior they treated the blacks very unfairly by not allowing them to do certain jobs, separating blacks and whites in restaurants, giving white people better housing, schooling transport and by having an unfair judicial system where a black person would be charged even without a proper trial.
Leading on from this, the last and worse racial event
is when T.J goes to the mercantile with the Simms brothers to get the gun T.J wanted. As the shop is closed they break in but it all goes horribly wrong when Mr and Mrs Barnett wake up and go downstairs to see what the noise is and the Simms brothers attack them. When the sheriff and the Simms brothers caught up with T.J he is wrongly accused of attacking the Barnetts and for the robbery. Furthermore he will be charged. This shows us how the law turns a blind eye to the crimes committed by the white people as the police always took their side even if they were in the wrong.
In conclusion, this novel shows us how hard it was for the blacks in the 1930’s and luckily in this day and age there is less prejudice then there was thanks to people like Martin Luther King who wanted peace between the blacks and whites and tried to do so peacefully, even so there is still some prejudice around but it is not legal segregation. Through the novel Cassie becomes less naïve about how and why blacks are treated so unfairly and she begins to understand how cruel life can be. We, the reader, also learn this lesson.